advent 2008

December 14, 2008

Distressing as the image may be, there are a few songs that I cannot hear without gyrating around my living room, arms waving and face grinning like a fool (even if only – perhaps thankfully - metaphorically speaking). ‘Simply Thrilled Honey’. ‘Pristine Christine’. ‘Keep The Circle Around’. ‘I’m Not Like Everybody Else’. The list is pretty long to be honest. And ever changing, as these things should be. This year ‘The Good Old Days’ became firmly ensconced in that list. How could it not?

Now I rarely pay attention to the world of mainstream Pop, but occasionally something crops up and I shake my head in disbelief. For there seem to be so many indentikit indie bands, each interchangeable with the next; a conveyor belt of mediocrity and decay. And each time I wonder how on earth those groups got there, when there are groups like The Lodger turning out such exquisite Pop perfection. But then, hasn’t it always been thus? Remember what Sneaky Feelings sang:

“Every Sunday night at ten we’d sit and watch the music show endAnd we’d discuss just how it was, how they got on instead of us…”

December 13, 2008

‘Days Of Summer’ - The Fallen LeavesFrom It’s Too Late Now (Parliament)

I first heard The Fallen Leaves in January 2006. Saw them play support for one of The Nightingales’ ‘come back’ shows. The Nightingales left me frustrated and cold that night, but there was something about The Fallen Leaves that thrilled me despite my truculent mood and sullen heart. What cut me deep was Rob Simmons guitar. Held high. Throwing out shards of sound that cut like razors. Just like they should. Just like when he was so young and doing the same in Subway Sect. I remember being less taken by the singer that night, but I’m willing to accept I was always going to take convincing on a night when my soul was darker than the shadows lurking around Hawksmoor’s Christ Church.

I was ready, therefore, to be left oscillating somewhere between thrilled skinny and mildly disappointed by The Fallen Leaves’ It’s Too Late Now set. No such worries, however, as it proved to be one of the finest rough edged diamonds in the record box marked ‘2008’. Here’s what John Carney, in his ‘Yr Heart Out’ fanzine said:

"It’s Too Late Now is one of those records that you think aren’t made anymore. It’s actually one of those records that have rarely ever been made. If you like the Pretty Things, Downliners Sect, Sorrows, Hammersmith Gorillas, the Feelgoods with Wilko, Purple Hearts, Jasmine Minks, Wolfhounds, then chances are you’ll love this record. And if you get all sniffy and sneer that all that sounds a bit old hat, then you’re a fool."

December 12, 2008

‘Articulate As’ – Young Liberals & The Legend!From The Legend! meets The Young Liberals uptown (unreleased)

Still in Brisbane, where The Legend! has relocated to, and here’s an incendiary, snarly punk squall courtesy of Everett and local garage outfit The Young Liberals. I am not sure if this album has been released, or if it is due to be so. It ought to be. The Young Liberals sound terrific on this, in the mould of Dirtbombs and their ilk. I’d love to see them play live. I bet they scorch the stage. The Legend! sounds terrific too. If you like that kind of thing. Which I do. I think it’s pure and contrived in the same breath. And that’s contrived as a compliment – as in completely understanding the tension between ‘authenticity’ and the creative act; knowing the parasitic nature of the music industry and operating both within it and against it.

It was a close call as to whether to post this track or the awesome ‘Mother’ - a tale of Daniel Johnston and Kurt Cobain (or ‘Mother’ if you prefer!) that is bittersweetly knowing, as you would expect. Alternatively, I could have opted for the sharp, punkpoptastic ‘We Won The War’ which has the Young Liberals taking up lead vocals and sounds, oooh, like a one and a half minute stab of Speed spiked lemonade. Or indeed any one of any of the sixteen tracks would have been pretty much perfect. Let’s hope it reaches a wider audience in 2009.

December 11, 2008

I don’t know if they consider themselves quite plain, but they do come from Brisbane. So there you go, a neat link from Robert Forster to The Bell Divers. How cool is that? And how cool was The Bell Divers’ June July set this year?

I don’t know about you, but it was one of my revelations. A bolt from the blue. A desperate, delirious delicacy. Trembling and tantalizing in all the right places, in all the right ways. A noise that nodded to Postcard memories and to those already apparently passed over Brooklyn groups like Pathways and My Teenage Stride. Pants Yell! too, lest we forget their already missed genius. The same kind of feeling. Straight to the heart.

Nearly as classy as Robert’s grey suited presence on the stage at the Queen Elizabeth Hall back in September. The best show of the year. The best show I’ve seen in such a long time. Who said Pop was a young person’s game?

It’s easy to lose track of people in the world of Pop. Artists change directions. More often we change directions ourselves. What once seemed so important fades in significance. That’s natural. The way it should be. But some things do remain with us. Some people remain special. Sometimes regardless of change. Sometime because our changes mesh; our developments through life seem to synchronize. We feel the connections.

The feeling of connection is what is important, and Robert Forster’s records have always connected. Certainly with me.

The day after the aforementioned show I went and bought myself a smart new Paul Smith suit. Grey, naturally. Was my decision influenced by Robert Forster? You bet. Was his The Evangelist one of the best records of the year? You bet.

December 09, 2008

It was Dan who first alerted me to the presence of The Bye Bye Blackbirds, through his always astute blog. I quickly picked up the 2006 release Honeymoon, and then the 2008 releases of Houses And Homes and the Apology Accepted EP. And yes, that’s ‘Apology Accepted’ as in the Go-Betweens song, which The Bye Bye Blackbirds cover with rare aplomb. It can be so hard to listen to covers of songs and groups that are so special to you, and I reckon I could count the number of attempts at the songs of Forster and McLennan I can listen to all the way through without cringing on one hand. Of course there’s a lovely nod to that Go-Betweens song in ‘Leave A Light On’, one of the many highlights of Houses And Homes, and it’s that kind of gentle nudge of reference that shines in The Bye Bye Blackbirds. They are a group suffused with the spirit of so many sweet sources, each mixed with a passionate delight and distilled into something new. There is a great deal of their West Coast soft psych pop heritage in there. The Byrds, Buffalo Springfield, Beach Boys, Millennium. There’s also a pleasing tinge of the Antipodes, and not just in that already alluded to inspiration of The Go-Betweens. For the charm of New Zealand groups like The Chills, and particularly the too often ignored Sneaky Feelings is also firmly reflected in the grooves of The Bye Bye Blackbirds. More than enough reasons to investigate.

December 08, 2008

This one came out way back at the start of February (or at least that’s when it was added to my iTunes library) and I admit that I had all but forgotten about it in the intervening ten months, until I was floored by it’s sheer infectious pop brilliance just the other day. Why did I not rave about it at the time? Goodness knows. By rights it should have been lighting up those grey, cold February days with its multicoloured Pop cascade, like a tidal wave of Skittles crashing through the icy puddles. But it’s okay in the end of course because it’s doing the same job in dreary December. And Hurrah! for that.

December 07, 2008

I’ve been putting together my ‘favourites of 2008’ mixes recently, and it occurred to me that rather than just have a list of my ten favourite records of the year or something, I would do a kind of advent calendar of 25 favourite songs. So, with a slightly belated start, here we go. I’ve backdated the first six entries to the appropriate dates.

“Like an estranged second cousin of Let's Wrestle from Up North, with a penchant for early '90s Mancunian sweeps of sound and Verlaine guitar squalls. You know, kind of like Paris Angels doing pirouettes around Magazine whilst gazing at the sun turning somersaults through the trees.” That’s what I wrote at the end of June and it says pretty much everything you need to know.

December 06, 2008

It seemed like 2008 was the year in which The Wave Pictures came of age, as it were. Or at least, it was the year in which a load more people perked up their ears and took notice. Instant Coffee Baby was a supreme collection of songs, and with a sound that came over like The Velvets jamming with The Subway Sect in a 1960’s Parisian café it was one of those records that prove difficult to prise from the turntable. Or CD player. Or iPod. Or whatever.